weekending

We spent the weekend quietly here, with some visits and some napping in between.

I don’t go shopping much any more these days (trying to live minimally and also the city centre with its noise and traffic and crowds tires me out so quickly) but on thursday I had the urge to go fabric shopping. I splurged on a navy blue corduroy and three lightweight summery floral prints. After weeks of sewing household items like pillow cases and laundry bags I didn’t realize how much I was missing sewing clothing.

I put the corduroy to use right away and happily sewed all weekend. By the time I was finished on Sunday it was too dark to take photos, but I’ll show off my new skirt next weekend :)

I have high plans for the florals as well. I’m thinking some modified Colette Sorbetto Top or Simplicity 2594 (I love this version of it).
I also finally ordered the seeds for my 2012 balcony garden and can’t wait for them to arrive so I can draw up lists and plans for our new balcony. These Kaffir lime seeds already arrived last week and I can’t wait to use them.

We’ve had a really mild winter until this week the freezing temperatures finally hit. Just in time when I’m thinking of spring and growing and buying summer fabrics!

lighter

Already the really dark days of winter are behind us and soon it will be light again going into work in the morning. It’s amazing how important that is, even this blue instead of pitch black is making a difference.

It’s been raining almost non-stop for days, so hardly any photos taken.
Family-wise we’re doing better, breathing lighter and trying to be patient, because it will be a long time before things will really and truly be well again. We’re ok with that.

I went to my first yoga class yesterday and loved it. I’m already looking forward to next week.
One step at a time and yet (and even though I often feel I don’t have much to share here) it feels good to be moving forward.

catching breath

With a two-day break in weeks of grey and rain, the weekend called for some outside time. I knew I needed to get out into the woods for a spell.

We drove out to a famous bridge that I hadn’t visited before and strolled around in the surrounding park and woods.

The bridge in golden afternoon sunlight is quite a sight. The rust makes it this gorgeous color.

Even on a cloudy january day the woods and stream are beautiful.

The light was fading quickly so we drove out to a nearby hill top town and watched the valley disappear in the darkness from a cozy café over waffles and tea.

making it happen

Well, it has been quite a start into 2012. A close family member of mine has been in hospital for a week after a breakdown and is now being treated for depression.
It has been a very emotional week and naturally we’re all very upset. I don’t think anyone who has not seen this happen to someone they love can really relate. It’s just devastating to see someone suffer so intensely and having to stand by and watch, knowing that nothing you say or do at this point can help relieve that suffering.
Thankfully things are looking a little better now than they did a week ago. It’s been an intense week and we all need some time to get our heads around what happened.

It has actually helped show me even more clearly that in 2012 I need to take better care of my health, both physically and mentally. In 2011 I was constantly trying to free up time to take things more slowly and be creative. What happened was that I filled a lot of that time just surfing the internet randomly and generally being online too much.

I’ve realized that I need to define firm time slots for things that are important for me. This is where I am so far in planning (you could call it Project Health I guess):

•   Setting a fixed time each morning for 10-15 minutes of meditation and stretching.
•   Taking 30 minutes out of my lunch break to get out of the office building, go for a walk and catch a bit of fresh air. I’ve been doing this for a couple of weeks now and it’s starting to make a huge difference to my well-being.
•   Limiting my online time to certain time frames (instead of it being the easy solution when I come home tired). So far I’m planning for this to be one hour in the morning (30 minutes if I sleep in) and one afternoon a week.
•   Looking for a yoga class to join nearby in addition to horseriding twice a week.
•   Blocking time slots in the evening for creative time. It doesn’t matter what I do in that time as long as I do it with my hands. This can be photography, sewing, knitting, crafting, whatever.
•   Blocking time slots to spend time with the kitties. I’ve wanted to take up clicker training with them again forever and it does us all a world of good to spend time with each other. Without a fixed time however this often gets overlooked.

Additionally my boyfriend and I are talking about setting up a fixed friday night movie night. We always talk about watching movies together and then we never get around to renting a film or setting up the TV for that matter.
We’ll see. We’re taking it a day at a time right now. It does feel like 2012 is very old already, instead of just 15 days in.

*Photos taken at random during my lunch break walk.

Another cowboy shoot

I’ve been meaning to share these photos since november. I was asked to take some photos of the guys at our barn who like to run around in full-flegded cowboy outfit at the weekends.

The aim of course was to make these look like real, vintage cowboy photos so while I liked the simple black and white processing, the vintage look is of course more dramatic.

There were ten or eleven guys to photograph within less than an hour! I’m only showing the best shots here, but every cowboy got his picture into the calender they eventually made from the photos.


So, just this quick sharing and now I’ll have to get ready for another week at work. Have a good week!

2012

Another year gone and I know I’m repeating myself, but how fast it’s come and gone!
This time last year I was looking forward to slowing down a little. My dad’s health problems only a few short months ago, myself still coming to terms with the anger and frustration that I had just left behind in a bad job situation and changes in daily life that came with adjusting from college to corporate world.

Looking back on 2011 now, it was a year of little outward changes for the first part of it- until we moved that is. Instead it was a year of taking a step back, trying to define for myself where I fit into this picture of having achieved my diploma, having settled down in an office job and accepting that this place (geographically even) is where I’ll be for as long as I can think ahead right now.
I was very reluctant to move apartments, which seems silly now that we love our new place so much. The reason was probably that I wasn’t “done” thinking all this through yet.

My New Year’s resolutions last year were:
1. Eat healthier and more local, which will include growing as much stuff as possible ourselves
2. Educate myself further in photography, gardening and sustainable living
3. Simplify and declutter.
Funnily enough, although a big part of the year felt like I was losing focus and looking to find it again, I achieved my resolutions. We now shop at the farmer’s market every Saturday and eat better at least at the weekends.
I did some nice photo shoots throughout the year (although still nowhere near where I’d like to be yet) and did the big balcony garden experiment, which was very successful in parts and will definitely continue in 2012. I realized “going green” is not one big overhaul but a step-by-step process that we are well on (now’s the point where I guiltily realize that I’ve been planning a post on that for months).
We threw or gave away approximately a third of our belongings and it was a long and painful process. Having worked hard at this for many months it feels so good now to be starting into a new phase in life with a clean slate.

So what’s in store for 2012? A lot I hope :)
:: More steps towards a simpler and greener life, more growing food and learning.
:: Hopefully a big step in photography.
:: But also, and very importantly, becoming better at keeping a balance between time and projects and resources, living more in the moment.
I have always been high-strung and this year I realized I am a highly sensitive person (here’s a great personal article about it), a term I wasn’t familiar with before but which makes so much sense now that I can’t believe how I lived without the knowledge. It means, in a nutshell, that I can get more absorbed in ideas, projects, creative endeavours, even my office work than most people. I burn for my ideas and experience and perceive things very intensely. The price for that is crashing harder at the end of the day than most people, both physically and emotionally.
My body lets me know fairly reliably when I run out of strength. The hard part is learning to stop to listen to it, dealing with the frustration of wanting to do so much and accepting that I can’t, that I must take it more slowly.

I realize I have blogged less in the past year and have sometimes failed to answer a comment and email and that is a trend that, quite frankly, will probably continue as 2012 gets busy. I love this blog and the friends I have made here but I find that too much online time makes me nervous. As one step towards more balance I’ve decided that in 2012 I will limit my online time to a reasonable amount.
Another step (and another resolution) will be learning how to meditate and incorporating that into my daily routine.

If you’ve actually read to the end of this, thank you! I am so grateful to have this blog as much as a personal outlet and as a place to interact and meet people from all over the world. Thank you for being here and I’m looking forward to sharing another year here with you :)

*As you’ve probably realized the photos in this post had nothing to do with the text, they’re just random horse shots from my now finished Project 52

the days in between

As fast as most weeks have flown by in 2011 these days in between christmas and New Year’s Eve have also gone by too fast.
We spent christmas with our families and had a christmas party at the barn.

Check out the beautiful colored jute twine in RosaMaria’s shop. I won some in a giveaway on her blog some weeks ago and have been meaning to blog about it ever since. I wrapped all my christmas presents with it. This is her blog, her sewing and photography is also gorgeous!


I dusted off my sewing machine and got to work on some projects. All still domestic sewing, pillowcases, laundry bags and such. I’m hoping to put together a tutorial for the laundry bags since I found a very quick way of making them out of thrifted duvet covers.

We’ve had grey and rainy days here and the light is dim even at midday. Which makes me crave sun and green and growing all the more, so I’ve checked out my garden notes from 2011 and made my list of seeds to order for 2012. Until then, I’ve bought some succulents, started sticking various citrus fruit seeds in little pots of soil (though none has sprouted yet) and brought some mint and lemon balm cuttings inside while the mother plants are still battling the cold outside. The little bits of green inside cheer me a lot, though I’ve always got to be careful not to take anything inside that might be poisonous for the kitties.

Other than that, lots of cuddling with the kitties on the couch, hot mugs of tea, reading and planning our holidays (we just booked a flight to Scotland for later in the year!).

My mom gave me the beautiful wool plaid blanket for christmas and both my boyfriend and I wear our Quiet Hare knitted slippers around the apartment at all times (check out Natalie’s blog too).
Some visiting and thrifting (and forever planning to photograph the finds). We donated six moving boxes full of stuff and are finally seeing the light at the end of the decluttering tunnel. About time too, we started decluttering well before moving and have grown a bit weary of it.


Looking forward to celebrating New Year’s Eve with friends tonight with games and great food. See you in 2012!

merry christmas

Oh boy, christmas really came too fast this year!
I worked up until yesterday, but we squeezed a last minute batch of christmas cookies in anyway.

We didn’t do much decorating (the cats took down any we tried to put up) but we got lots of chocolate and goodies at work. One freebie was this baby christmas tree that we got sent and which my colleagues saved for me, knowing I would love it. It came with instructions to pot it and keep it on the balcony and it even came with tiny christmas ornaments. What a beautiful idea to give as a company christmas present instead of sending out junk that will get thrown out immediately!
I’m hoping it’ll be big enough to keep as a small potted tree on the table next christmas and the years after that.

I wish you all a wonderful and restful time with your family and friends.

christmas party

My work has an elaborate theme christmas party each year, something for everyone to look forward to throughout the year. This year the motto was “Casino” and there were some great costumes. I only took a handful of photos, since the venue was very dark, but here’s a glimpse of the atmosphere.

my point of view

After spending every waking hour for the last five days on our new couch I’ve decided I still like it a lot but wouldn’t mind actually setting foot out of the door again.
The cats have been splendid company though, not leaving my side for a minute and even following me around the apartment on the rare occasions I actually got up (which I didn’t have to do very often, because my awesome boyfriend brought me medicine and tea and broth right up on a tray).

They love it when we’re home during the day, but they’re not usually so clingy so I think they must have sensed how awful and cold I’ve felt.
Today’s a lot better already and after a three-hour nap I even felt well enough to pick up the camera, to share a few shots of our new place.


Two rugs we ordered from a small weaving company in Austria got delivered last week and we (both humans and felines) totally love them. This is their website (german language only), they sell made-to-order woven sheep-wool and cotton rugs.


I can’t say how much I’m looking forward to eating something other than broth tonight. I already treated myself to chocolate this afternoon. Isn’t my life riveting :)


Seeing me up and taking pictures the cats seem to have decided I’m well enough to be let out of their sight for a while. This is them playing a favourite game, “chase the sunny spots in the room”.

Don’t be fooled though, about two minutes after this was taken, one of them started scratching that lamp and the sideboard very slowly and deliberately, while looking straight at me, saying as plainly as could be “You’re up and better, I am going to keep scratching your precious new furniture until we all head to the kitchen and you give me some food”.
Cats are the best.